Guus Hiddink has told the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf he is holding talks with Chelsea over a second stint as interim manager at Stamford Bridge.
The 69-year-old Dutchman arrived in London on Friday to meet Chelsea directors over a short-term role to replace José Mourinho.
Hiddink told De Telegraaf he would listen to Chelsea’s proposals before deciding whether to return to the club he coached to the FA Cup title in 2009. “I want to get some good insight before I make my decision,” said Hiddink.
Chelsea’s owner Roman Abramovich, who tends to delegate club matters to his board, was at the Cobham training ground where he was pictured meeting the players.
If Hiddink takes the job it will be the second interim stint from the Dutchman after he took charge for three and a half months at the end of the 2008-09 season when Luiz Felipe Scolari was sacked, and he went on to win the FA Cup.
The task facing Hiddink is more onerous than the last time he took over when Chelsea were fourth in the Premier League, seven points off the leaders, Manchester United. They now lie in 16th place with only a one-point cushion to the relegation zone.
Hiddink, though, is unlikely to be considered a permanent appointment with his star having been on the wane since 2009. After leaving Chelsea he continued his coaching role at Russia but they lost to Slovenia in the World Cup play-offs and he left the job the following summer.
He had a spell with the Turkey national team, in which he failed to qualify for Euro 2012, before joining Anzhi Makhachkala and then resigning in 2013. Hiddink succeeded Louis van Gaal as manager of the World Cup finalists Holland but that proved a disaster and he resigned in June after it became increasingly likely they would fail to qualify for Euro 2016.
Abramovich is looking at other managers for the long term, chief among them Diego Simeone of Atlético Madrid. There is also a long-standing interest in Bayern Munich’s Pep Guardiola, together with the Italy manager, Antonio Conte. A previous Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti said he has not been contacted by the club over the vacant role but is anyway in the frame to replace Guardiola at Bayern.
Mourinho was dismissed in a 10-minute meeting with the chairman, Bruce Buck, and director, Eugene Tenenbaum – moments after he had finished his Christmas lunch at the club’s annual party – from a four-year contract worth £13m a year.
The club’s technical director, Michael Emenalo, said: “There obviously seemed to be a palpable discord between manager and players and we feel it was time to act. The owner is forced to make what was a very tough decision for the good of the club. We are one point above relegation and that’s not good enough. Any fan can understand this club is in trouble and something needed to be done.”
